This invention relates to a mounting socket installed in a compartment such as a refrigerator and is adapted to permit simple installation and support of a horizontally extending support device such as a shelf support member within the compartment.
In certain compartments having shelf assemblies such as in household refrigerators there is a thin plastic liner forming the inside of the compartment which has been molded to the desired shape. In the plastic molding process in order to remove the formed liner from the mold it is necessary to have draft on each side which means that the side walls near the back of the liner forming the compartment are closer together than the side walls near the front of the compartment. After the formed compartment liner is incorporated in a refrigerator cabinet it is necessary to install horizontal support devices such as rectangular wire shelves which will support food items in the compartment. These wire shelves are rectangular in shape and desirably have the same width front and back and usually have the front support member and the rear support member extending outwardly of the shelf so that they may be supported on projections mounted on the side walls of the compartment. In some instances these support members are inserted into sockets which are installed through the compartment liner into the insulation between the liner and the outer case of the refrigerator. It is desirable that the horizontally extending support device cooperate with the mounting socket so that when the shelf is loaded with food items for storage there is sufficient support to prevent the horizontally extending support device from shifting laterally and becoming dislodged from the mounting socket causing the shelf to fall. This can be a problem where the sockets are mounted in the side walls at the front of the compartment which are spaced apart further than at the rear of the compartment and if the same dimension sockets are used for both locations.
Shelf mounting sockets particularly for refrigerator cabinets have been utilized in the past and one such example is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 2,620,255 wherein there is a shelf support socket provided that has a tubular body with a cavity terminating in an end wall which carries an inwardly extending compressible plug which is compressed by engagement with a shelf frame member but returns to its original length when the shelf is in its final position. One difficulty with this type of mounting socket is that frequent removable of the wire frame members into and out of the sockets has a tendency to reduce their effectiveness as the loss of resiliency deteriorates with age and the plug is distorted or destroyed after multiple insertions. It would, therefore, be advantageous to have a mounting socket that is rigid yet accomplishes the same function of centering the wire frame members to prevent one end from falling out of the socket.
Another example of a mounting socket is described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,195,888 wherein the mounting socket is inserted through the compartment liner into insulation of a refrigerator between the liner and the outer case. The mounting socket has only one final resting position for the mounting device which is not acceptable in the case of compartments wherein the side walls at the rear of the compartment are spaced apart a lesser distance than the side walls at the front of the compartment and the same mounting socket is used in both locations. It would be desirable to be able to have a rigid mounting socket that could be used at both the rear of the compartment and at the front of the compartment such that the draft formed in the compartment liner during the molding process is balanced out so that there is a minimal amount of lateral movement of the horizontally extending support device at the front of the compartment. That is, there should be a mounting system that is the same width front and back so that a rectangular wire shelf having equal length front and back support wires may be received in the compartment and have sufficient mounting socket support at the front as well as the rear of the compartment using the same interchangeable mounting sockets.
By this invention there is provided a mounting device that provides for the desirable advantages mentioned above.